I'd go with the pyrometer. If your pyro is right you can run 1100 all day but you need to be careful. use that horsepower going up the hill and down shift and cool it off before you go over the top by down shifting and running against the govenor to pump lots of water the last half mile or so. give it throttle a couple times going over the other side to put some heat back in the heads so they dont cool real fast and crack. the reason the pyro is so handy is when the water temp gauge lies. most engines will run at 900 degrees. if your water temp gauge says 130 because a hose broke and there is no water to read the pyro will start to climb right off the dash at which time you can shut down and save your engine. pretty cool hu

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"Ammo Warrior" Keepers Of The Peace, Creators Of Destruction.Gold is the money of Kings, Silver is the money of Gentlemen, Barter is the money of Peasants, Debt is the money of Slaves.

My comment was of a more general nature in that any time you do something the original manufacturer didn't do, in order to improve performance, we need to be sure of unintended outcomes.

For instance, the manufacturer may have intended some loss of heat around the pipes, and there may be heat related issues downstream that the engineering of original parts may not withstand reliably.

For the most part, the original equipment engineering has been quite thorough, and when we mess around, we trade long term reliability for short term gain. Of course, as a busnut, long term reliability/short term gain may be a completely different relative term from a commercial enterprise driving many thousands of miles a year versus our paltry mileage, but none the less, we have to understand the effects of our actions on the rest of the package, decide if we are willing to face the consequences, and act accordingly!

As far as wrapping pipes is concerned, I'd be wrapping them to either reduce the fire hazard in the engine room or reduce the heat transfer to the engine room, more than for a performance boost. I'll suggest that you won't feel the difference in performance.